Bartolomé & Santiago
This morning we had an early wake-up call in order to visit one of the most famous islands in the archipelago, Bartolomé. Waking early is not only good to avoid the heat in the morning, but the light that shone on the famous Pinnacle Rock gave us a sense of how wonderful these islands are.
While climbing the steps we could see some lava tubes and spatter cones that made us think we were on the moon, and at the summit we had a great view of the Pinnacle Rock and the beautiful golden beach where we went snorkeling after breakfast.
Probably this spot was one of the best snorkeling sites that we’ve had the entire week. There were black tip shark pups very close to the shore, three large white tip sharks, and thousands of salemas and cardinal fish. The water was so clear we could see all the beautiful colors on the parrot fish and so many others.
In the afternoon we visited Puerto Egas on Santiago Island. In the inner part of the trail we could see lava lizards trying to catch painted locust, and mockingbirds and doves looking for seeds. At the end of this trail we walked on a lava flow along the coast. At the grottos we saw Galápagos fur seals playing in the water and a sea turtle that came in to visit this quiet place.
Walking back along the coast our young explorers were barefoot, investigating the tidal pools and finding all types of shore birds, crabs and colorful shells. At the end of the trail a sea lion mom was feeding her young pup and this sitting gave us a sense that we will never forget this enchanted place.
